Fran McCaffery

Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s home sweep of Columbia and Cornell

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Penn has a clear path to an Ivy Madness berth after pulling off one of its best Palestra homestands in years.

The Quakers (13-10, 6-4 Ivy) have a tight grip on third place in the League standings after using a late surge to rally past Columbia on Friday, 76-67, and following that effort up with an 82-76 triumph over Cornell in a game that was played within a possession for much of the evening.

Penn, by virtue of its head-to-head sweep over Cornell (12-11, 5-5), is effectively two games ahead of the Big Red with four to play. If the Quakers just go .500 in their remaining contests, they’ll be two steps away from their first trip to the NCAA Tournament since 2018.

It’s a position that few outside observers expected Penn to be in, given its opening KenPom ranking of 275 and consensus seventh-place pick in the Ivy preseason poll.

But now? The Quakers look like an ascending team in its first year under Fran McCaffery, who has taken a team which consists almost entirely of players he did not recruit and turned it into one of the most improved teams in the country.

How much so? We’ll get into that now, starting with how …

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s win over Princeton

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PHILADELPHIA — The streak is dead.

After 14 consecutive losses to its most hated rivals, Penn finally — finally — took out hated Princeton at the Palestra on Saturday by the thinnest of margins, 61-60. The Quakers (11-10, 4-4 Ivy) now sit atop a four-team morass in third place in the Ivy League and hold their destiny in their own hands.

It should have surprised no one that Penn needed to extend to its absolute limit to finally take out the Tigers (8-15, 4-4). The Quakers led by as many as 12 points in the second half on the back of some intense defense, but an extended offensive outage let Princeton climb back into the game.

The afternoon came down to a one-on-one defensive stand by Quakers sophomore point guard AJ Levine against the Tigers’ best player, Dalen Davis. Levine poked the ball away from Davis at the top of the key as the game clock wound below 10 seconds, then forced Davis into a difficult contested midrange jumper which caught front iron and bounced harmlessly away.

Levine was mobbed by his teammates as he flexed to the crowd, a moment of catharsis after eight years of frustration of heartbreak.

What did Quakers fans learn from an exhilarating day?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s home loss to Yale

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PHILADELPHIA — That Penn lost to Yale in its first matchup against the overwhelming Ivy League favorite should not have come as a shock to anyone.

But it’s the way the Quakers fell at home that should leave a frustrating taste in fans’ mouths.

Penn (9-9, 2-3 Ivy) played well below what it was capable of in a 77-60 loss to the Bulldogs (15-3, 4-1). The Quakers missed plenty of shots they normally hit and put up a season-worst 0.9 points per possession. On the other end of the floor, Yale scored 42 points in the paint, which more than made up for Penn’s admirable efforts to force turnovers and limit the damage from the Bulldogs’ elite outside shooting attack.

The Quakers held several leads throughout the first half but gave up an extended 12-2 run heading into the break which gave Yale a relatively comfortable 10-point edge. Penn had several chances to cut the Bulldogs’ lead to one possession early in the second half but never put any serious game pressure on Yale.

Penn’s defeat was expected, but it now puts a tremendous amount of pressure on next week’s road back-to-back against Columbia and Cornell. Both of these teams are right alongside the Quakers in a six-car pileup that separates second and seventh in the league standings by a single game.

A sweep would be devastating to Penn’s hopes of making Ivy Madness in its first year under Fran McCaffery.

What did fans learn from an underwhelming afternoon?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball downing Dartmouth

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Penn men’s basketball picked up a critical victory in its first extended road trip of Ivy League play on Saturday, taking advantage of a spectacular second half to down Dartmouth, the last unbeaten team in the league standings, 84-74.

The Quakers (9-7, 2-1 Ivy) overcame a string of early self-imposed issues thanks to dominant halves from their two best players. Ethan Roberts carried the team in the first half while TJ Power was confined to the bench with foul trouble; Power scored nine points in the 12-0 run early in the second stanza which gave the Quakers the lead for the rest of the afternoon.

Power lived up to his last name during that decisive run. He started it off by dribbling into a wide-open three, then gave the Quakers the lead with a spinning drive on Dartmouth (8-8, 2-1) wing Jayden Williams. No one the Big Green threw at Power could handle the 6-foot-9 junior.

Suddenly, the Ivy season looks wide-open for the Quakers, who are now in a five-way tie for the league lead. Monday’s matchup with fellow 2-1 team Harvard looms as a massive opportunity.

What did Penn fans learn from a happy start to the long weekend?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s win over Brown

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Penn avoided the dreaded 0-2 start to Ivy play thanks to a pair of sterling performances from its senior leaders.

Wings Ethan Roberts and Michael Zanoni scored 28 and 20, respectively, in an 81-73 win over Brown at the Palestra. No other Quakers player scored more than nine. The win had the added benefit of snapping a four-game losing streak to the Bears (6-9, 0-2 Ivy).

Penn (8-7, 1-1) scored an efficient 1.2 points per possession against a good defensive team. The Quakers badly needed it, given their own defensive struggles. The Red and Blue managed to get to the halftime locker room tied despite an awful start, then seized control of the game with a 13-6 run out of the break.

Zanoni gave Penn a lead it would not surrender with an open three by the right sideline off a nice feed out of the lane by Roberts 50 seconds into the second half. Roberts later capped off the run with a wide-open three from the left wing thanks to a good screen from big man Augustus Gerhart with 16:17 to go in the half.

What did Penn fans learn from a solid win?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s loss at Princeton

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PRINCETON, N.J. — The faces on the court and the sideline were new, but in the end, the result for Penn was the same in its Ivy League opener: a crushing loss to Princeton.

Penn has only beaten its biggest rivals five times since Barack Obama was elected president in 2008. It’s a streak of futility that has now spanned four different head coaching regimes.

The Quakers (7-7, 0-1 Ivy), over the past few years, have developed a habit of finding new and unique ways to lose to Princeton (5-11, 1-0). They’ve squandered big leads, been blown out of the water and lost heartbreakers in the final seconds. Monday night had a little bit of everything.

Penn built a 14-point lead in the first half, saw it all wash away thanks to a stretch of atrocious defense and then mounted a furious rally to get one last shot to win the game. The Tigers could only exhale after point guard AJ Levine’s contested three at the buzzer hit back iron, which sealed a 78-76 win.

What did Quakers fans learn from another excruciating trip to Jadwin Gymnasium?

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LISTEN – Princeton men’s basketball squeaks past Penn

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Ivy Hoops Online correspondent George “Toothless Tiger” Clark recaps a 78-76 win for Princeton men’s basketball (5-11, 1-0 Ivy) over archrival Penn (7-7, 0-1) to open Ivy League play at Jadwin Gym Monday night:

Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s win over NJIT

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Penn closed out the nonconference portion of its schedule strong, using a 17-0 run early in the second half to power its way past NJIT for an 80-61 win.

The Quakers (7-6) entered Wednesday as 14.5 point favorites, but certainly didn’t look the part in the early stages after a litany of injuries forced coach Fran McCaffery to tap players normally stuck on the bench. It took a buzzer-beating three from sophomore point guard AJ Levine to get Penn into the halftime locker room with a narrow two-point lead.

McCaffery ratcheted down the substitutions in the second half and Levine put together arguably his best half in a Penn uniform. During that aforementioned 17-0 run, Levine put up a personal 8-0 scoring burst and added two steals and two assists, to boot. The Highlanders (5-10) never trailed by single digits again the rest of the afternoon.

What did Penn fans learn from a happy start to their New Year’s Eve celebration?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball’s 70-69 loss at Rutgers

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PISCATAWAY, N.J. — Penn’s first game against Rutgers in 50 years should have been a statement win.

It wound up becoming a collapse right up there with the worst losses of the Steve Donahue era.

Plagued by a toxic combination of fouls, turnovers, mental mistakes and poor free throw shooting, the Quakers frittered away the 66-59 lead they held with 2:24 to play against the Scarlet Knights at Jersey Mike’s Arena Saturday night.

The coup de grâce in a 70-69 loss came when junior forward TJ Power missed two free throws with eight seconds left that would have effectively iced the game. After the second miss, Rutgers (6-6) guard Tariq Francis capped off a career-high 34-point evening by draining a pull-up game-winning three-pointer with 0.9 seconds to play over a good contest from freshman guard Jay Jones.

For Penn (6-5), the only saving grace about the loss is that it occurred in nonconference play and means nothing for the team’s Ivy and postseason ambitions. It’s better for this young team to learn a harsh lesson like this now when it can still be used as a learning experience.

So, about that learning experience. What did fans learn on Saturday night?

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Quakeaways from Penn men’s basketball eking out win over Lafayette

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Penn men’s basketball took a circuitous — and fortuitous — path to victory in its first game without Ethan Roberts.

The Quakers (6-4) started hot against Lafayette, building an early 16-point lead. But then the offense stagnated, the Leopards began to hit shots and Penn needed a favorable whistle (or lack thereof) and one last stop to escape with a 74-72 win at the Palestra Monday evening.

The Leopards (3-8) were deprived of a chance to get the game’s final shot while trailing only by one point after the referees incorrectly ruled that a mid-range jumper from forward TJ Power hit the rim. Instead of being hit with a shot clock violation, the Quakers were able to corral the offensive rebound thanks to a winning play from forward Lucas Lueth.

Cam Thrower was fouled with 4.7 seconds on the clock and split a pair of free throws; Lafayette’s Mark Butler was able to get off a desperation attempt at a game-tying layup just before the buzzer sounded, but a good contest from forward Augustus Gerhart helped force the shot offline.

The Quakers may have gotten a little lucky, but you never apologize for winning. Penn fans will have plenty to contemplate about the state of the team heading into its finals break, starting with how …

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